Spam levels have spiked in 2009, rising above the 85 percent mark for the first time since 2007, according to MessageLabs' monthly
Intelligence Report. The chief reason for the sudden up-tick appears to be image spam originating in China.
Unlike the image spam from two years ago, where images were attached to the message, these messages are designed to fool email filters by hosting the image on the Web. Attackers obfuscate the link embedded in the email so that it appears to be a trusted website, but the link redirects to a site with malicious content.
This is similar to how a recent
Facebook phishing attack works. A recipient receives a message from a Facebook friend that only says "hello" and offers a link. Clicking on the link leads to what appears to be a Facebook log-in page, but careful attention to the URL shows it is not. It's actually a way for attackers to gain access to Facebook accounts.
This year's spate in image spam originates in China, or appears to, since the links in question redirect to .cn domains. (In the Facebook example, they redirect to a .net domain). MessageLabs explains the boost in Chinese domains for spam is a direct result of the
McColo shutdown of last autumn, which dropped spam levels down to 69 percent and forced spammers to regroup elsewhere in places with fewer restrictions.
Though the spam level itself has increased, the number of viruses and phishing schemes in the unwanted email has decreased slightly, probably because of a new focus on web-based malware. Only 63 percent of web-based malware was intercepted in April, leaving a fairly high success rate. Pop-up ads were up by over 21 percent in April as spyware and adware increased by 27 percent.
One in 304 emails contains a virus and one in 404 emails is a phishing attack, which seems hardly comparable to web-based dangers. An average of 3,561 new sites harboring malware are set up daily. Broken down, 250 new sites hosting spyware are created daily, and 3,311 are created with viruses.
The United Kingdom is the most spammed country in the world with spam levels reaching 94 percent of all email, followed by China (90%), Hong Kong (89%), Australia (88%), Japan (86%), Germany (83%), the US (79%), the Netherlands (78%), and Canada (77%).
